At the Market

Cristina Dumitru-Pascal
We're not debating over this. I don't haggle at the market. That's the final price. No negotiation. Anything extra, you have to pay. For blue eyes, ten thousand; blonde, five thousand. Under three years old, twenty thousand. No papers? Add another fifty thousand to the price. And trust me, goods as great as ours, healthy and easy to procure, you won't find anywhere else. So, have you decided? Who do you want? The one in the waiting room? That one is mine, but if you triple your offer, why not?! When I tried to get in touch with her, my mother didn't want to see me. I just wanted her to know that I was okay. I told her I'd pay her to meet me. She accepted. She had been the director of the orphanage.
 
 Gabriel Rusu
Girl, I broke off the engagement with Doru. God, I'm in complete shock, am I overstepping if I ask you to reveal the source of your trauma? I visited his parents house, he introduced me to his family, we gave them the big news, everything was sunshine and rainbows, until the next day. We went to the market to buy organic meat for barbecue, and there, this old man offered me a taste of momârlan^[1] cheese. I shyly asked what kind of animal a momârlan was and that idiot Doru burst out laughing like a stupid oaf. How am I, Miss Sector 2 of Bucharest, supposed to tolerate that kind of treatment?

 Ionuț Morariu
The first time, I reached out my hand was out of hunger. Stronger than iron, the emptiness in my stomach ate up my pride. Like the resurrected one said: trampling down ego by hunger. Since then, I've been a beggar. I set myself up in the market and open my palm. I don't say a word. I just stare into nothingness. And because people value my golden silence, they pay for it, two, maybe three copper coins. Wash yourself for once, a lady sometimes sneers. What should I tell her? That this is how a soul smells when it starts to ripen? A poor, unripe fruit. I'm just an orchard, waiting for the great harvest.

 
(Translated by Adina-Lorena Dulamă / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year I / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)